This is a post written from a future date so I’ll make it brief. More on Texas another time. I loved Texas and it was the highlight so far. It’s time to leave and head to El Paso.

A last look around Marfa, pretty much the second to last town west on the extreme southern link, before the couple of hundred miles to El Paso. Staying south has been a good decision.

And swing by the church for the last time

And off we went, sad to see things for maybe the last time we’d quickly loved, even after a short two weeks. I wish it had been a month.

Surrounded by military bases as we have been in the desert country, we were on the road from Marja to Valentine with the road to ourselves as usual. I never see anybody on the road. Choosing to travel on backroads or B roads in the late fall, early winter is like this.
However this afternoon we have company. Ahead of me on the right, to the north and about half a mile ahead is this white spot. I’m looking at it thinking it’s a balloon or something but I can’t make any progress towards it, which bothers me somehow. I can’t figure it out. Then all of a sudden I start making huge progress on it and lo and behold it’s a rigid dirigible. Here’s what he looked like crossing me before he falls back.

Then, to my surprise it crosses the road ahead of me and starts matching my speed, slightly ahead. I think holy shit, it’s a drone. It has two slightly darker spots, one in front and one behind a lower bulb under the main fuselage that look like hardware. I can’t see any propulsion method though and never do. Obviously I’m weirded out that it’s matching my speed so I stop. It stops, quickly, like suddenly. Then I speed up and so does he. Then he falls back and goes into the sun, behind me and to the left (southeast). I look for his shadow but can’t find it. I stop a couple of times to see where he is and he’s in the sun. Anyway I’ve blown off a half hour this way and blast off west. Some twenty-five year old in a room fifty miles away has had a good laugh practicing his skills at my expense I think happily and we go on our way.